Documentation — Premiere Copilot Notes

Quick Start

From download to your first timecode-linked note. The whole thing takes about five minutes.

1

Quit Premiere Pro completely

Not just the window — quit the application. The installer cannot write into a running copy of Premiere.

2

Install the panel

Double-click Install Copilot Notes.command, keeping it in the same folder as the .ccx file. If macOS warns that it is from an unidentified developer, right-click → Open → Open once. That is normal for beta software.

3

Open the panel in Premiere

Window → Extensions → Copilot Notes. If it is not in that menu, quit Premiere fully and open it again — the extension list is only read at launch.

4

Open a sequence and write a note

Park the playhead where the note belongs and type into the composer — the timecode is captured for you. Typing @ inserts the playhead timecode anywhere in a note, and ⌘⇧N jumps straight to the composer.

5

Put it on the timeline

Press Add Marker on a note card and the note becomes a Premiere marker at that frame. Existing markers can be imported back in as notes.

6

Bring in your script

Go to Script → Import and open a PDF, Word file, Fountain or Final Draft document, or paste plain text. Then press Lay out to map it onto the sequence and open the Timeline tab.

Requirements

Premiere Pro	2024 or later (the manifest requires `premierepro 24.0.0`). Built and verified against Premiere Pro 2026 (26.3.2) on macOS.
Platform	UXP panel — installs as a `.ccx` through Creative Cloud Desktop. The beta installer supplied is a macOS `.command` script.
Sign-in	None. There is no account, no licence check and no activation.
Internet	Not required. The panel works entirely offline in this beta.
Panel size	300×400 minimum. It opens at 360×720 docked and 480×800 floating.
Version check	The running version is shown at the bottom of the panel. If the number does not change after a reload, the panel has not reloaded.

The five tabs

Everything in the panel lives on one of five tabs. The same reference is built into the panel itself, under Settings → About → Documentation.

📝

Notes

List and board views, filtered by status and priority. Filters and sorting apply as you type, and search covers keywords, tags and timecodes.

📄

Script

Write or import a script. Three layouts: single column, scene-grouped, and a two-column A/V view for visual and audio.

🔄

Compare

Diff a saved version against the current script, with word-level changes and per-line restore.

🎬

Timeline

The script mapped onto the sequence — colour-coded segments, note pips and a live playhead.

⚙️

Settings

Defaults, backups, collaborators, keyboard shortcuts, and the in-panel documentation and release notes.

⌨️

Command palette

⌘K opens every action by name, so nothing has to be hunted for in a 360px panel.

How it works

🎥 Notes that live on the frame

A note keeps the timecode it was written at, so a comment lands on the frame rather than in a separate app you have to keep in sync.

Click a timecode on a card to jump the playhead to it.
Notes are scoped to the active sequence, so each edit gets its own set.
Out-of-range timecodes are flagged before you save, and deleted notes offer to take their marker with them.

📌 Notes as Premiere markers

The timeline can carry your thinking: push a note to a marker, or import existing markers back in as notes.

Colour is set per note status when the marker is created.
Markers stay linked, so deleting a note can delete its marker.
Convert all → Markers pushes a whole filtered set in one pass.

📁 Local-first storage

Notes and script are written as plain JSON into a .copilot_notes folder beside your .prproj.

Move or archive the project folder and the notes travel with it.
Writes are atomic, so an interrupted save cannot truncate a note set.
Nothing is uploaded, and there is no account to sign in to.

🛡️ Built to survive a bad day

Automatic backups, crash recovery and conflict detection are part of the storage layer rather than an add-on.

Auto-backup on a timer, kept per note set.
If a newer backup is found on load, the panel offers to restore it.
If the JSON changes underneath you, it asks Reload or Keep mine instead of overwriting.
Export and re-import a single .json bundle to move work between machines — merged by note id, newest wins.

Where your notes are saved

Everything the panel writes is a file you can find, copy or delete yourself.

What	Where
Notes and script	A `.copilot_notes` folder next to your `.prproj`, as plain JSON.
Mirror copy	The plugin's own data folder. If you move only the project file, the mirror is how the notes are recovered.
Backups	A `backups/` folder inside the note set. Settings → General controls how many are kept.
Exports	Wherever you choose in the OS save sheet — the panel never writes an export on its own.
Settings	Stored per panel, alongside the mirror, so your defaults survive a project change.
Premiere logs	`~/Library/Logs/Adobe/Adobe Premiere Pro 2026/` — the newest `UXPLogs_*.log` is what to send with a bug report.

⚠️ Deleting the folder deletes the notes

Removing .copilot_notes/ removes that project's notes and its script. There is no server-side copy to restore from — the mirror and the backups exist for exactly that reason, so keep the folder with the project when you archive it.

Exporting

One dialog writes the notes, the script, or both, in twelve formats.

Group	Formats
Script	PDF · DOCX · Final Draft · Fountain · Markdown · plain text
Blocks	Blocks · CSV — one row per script block
Notes	Notes · Markdown · Notes · CSV
Combined	Script + Notes · Markdown
Timeline	Timeline · CSV — one row per anchored block
Backup	JSON bundle, for moving or merging a note set

Layouts

The Layout selector rearranges the output for the text formats:

Single column — blocks in order, as before.
Scenes — grouped under SCENE n headings, with timecodes and speakers.
A/V two-column — visual and audio in aligned columns, so a row reads across.

Scope

Export the whole set, the current scene, or a filtered selection — and the preview is built from exactly the functions the file writer uses, so what you read is what you get.

Known beta limitation: PDF, DOCX and Final Draft are single-column writers. The Scenes and A/V layouts apply to Markdown, plain text, CSV and the notes formats only, and the dialog says so.

Keyboard shortcuts

The panel uses ⌘ on macOS and Ctrl on Windows. Every binding can be changed in Settings → Keys, including a Premiere-style preset.

Shortcut	Action
⌘K	Command palette — every action by name
⌘1 / ⌘2	Jump to Notes / Script
⌘Z / ⌘⇧Z	Undo / redo, across both notes and script
⌘⇧N	New note
⌘⇧F	Focus search
⌘⇧E	Export
⌘↵	Save the note you are writing
@	Insert the playhead timecode in a note
Enter / Tab	Accept a timecode suggestion while typing
Esc	Close a dialog or the palette

Known limitations in this beta

These are known and deliberate. None of them are bugs, and all of them are on the list.

Limitation	Detail
No AI features yet	The AI tab is visible but switched off. It stores settings for a later release and nothing is sent anywhere.
PDF, Word and Final Draft exports are single-column	The Scenes and A/V layouts work for Markdown and plain text only.
Cards cannot be dragged between A/V columns	The two-column view is read-and-edit, not re-arrange.
Timeline colours are approximate	They are derived from whether a block has notes or a speaker, not from a recorded / locked / draft status.
Only the active sequence is listed	Premiere's plugin API does not let a panel enumerate every sequence in a project, so the dropdown offers the active sequence plus any sequence you have previously written notes for.

Privacy

🔒 Nothing leaves your machine

No telemetry, no analytics. The plugin collects no usage data.
No account. Nothing is sent in the background.
No AI call in this build. The AI tab is disabled and says so on screen.
Notes, script and settings are files on your own drive, in .copilot_notes/.

🔑 Permissions the panel asks for

Local file system (full access) — to store notes beside your project.
Network — reserved for the opt-in AI features of a later phase. Nothing uses it in this beta.
Launch process — to open http, https and mailto links you click.

Troubleshooting & feedback

Your feedback is the whole point of this stage. Please be blunt.

If something looks wrong

The most useful report is short and concrete. Send it to [email protected] with:

Include	Why it helps
What you did	The steps, in order.
What you expected	Half of every fix is knowing the intent.
What happened	A screenshot is worth a lot.
Your setup	Premiere version, and macOS or Windows.
The version number	Shown at the bottom of the panel, for example `v1.29.0`.
The log file	If something crashes or a button does nothing, send the newest `UXPLogs_*.log` from `~/Library/Logs/Adobe/Adobe Premiere Pro 2026/`.

The panel is not in the Extensions menu? Quit Premiere fully and open it again — the extension list is read once, at launch.

📧 Email

[email protected]

💬 WhatsApp

+94 76 212 9696